Richard Baker - Final Gate

Xhalph inclined his head, accepting her explanation. He was unconvinced but saw no point in arguing about it. Of course, he had most of the strength of his demonic father, a mighty glabrezu. Xhalph could crumple armor plate in his bare hands, or cleave a strong human knight and the horse on which he rode with a single blow of one of his heavy scimitars. But he overlooked the fact that few of Sarya’s fey’ri possessed such a distinguished bloodline. He’d never needed old lore or skill at magic to master his foes, when pure physical ferocity sufficed.

Just as well, Sarya decided. Given his formidable physical prowess, an inclination toward arcane study or subtle plotting would have made him too dangerous to her. She had already been forced to destroy her son Ryvvik not long after the three Dlardrageths had been freed from the vaults beneath Hellgate Keep, simply because Ryvvik was gifted with a subtle and treacherous turn of mind. She would not like to do the same to Xhalph and start over again with new offspring.

A flutter of wings behind her caught her attention. “Lady Sarya, Teryani Ealoeth has returned from the Sembian camp,” a fey’ri said, bowing before her. “She craves an audience with you.”

Sarya frowned. Teryani was her spy and assassin in the midst of the Sembian army. Each time she ventured to leave the Sembians and report, she risked discovery… but Teryani was not the sort to waste Sarya’s time.

“Very well. Have her join us.”

The messenger thumped his breastplate in salute and sprang back up into the air, winging back to his post. He quickly returned with a strikingly beautiful fey’ri in tow. Teryani had a finely shaped face with large, dark eyes, hair of silken midnight, and a soft, coy smile that could incite men to kill when she willed it. She knelt before Sarya, and said, “My queen.”

Sarya smiled coldly at the deference the girl showed, and motioned for her to rise. “Teryani, my dear. What brings you here?”

“I have news that seemed important, Lady Sarya. I saw Ilsevele Miritar ride into Tegal’s Mark with the champion Starbrow, a little more than a day ago. They are waiting for an audience with Miklos Selkirk.”

“Did you learn what business they have with Selkirk?”

“Miritar’s daughter has been sent to work out a truce with the Sembians,” Teryani said. “Moreover, I think she may hope to make an ally of Sembia.”

The daemonfey queen hissed in irritation and shook out her wings with a quick snap. Without even thinking about it, she began to pace restlessly, a habit she had formed since escaping from the imprisonment of millennia. Teryani simply awaited her queen’s will with equanimity, hands folded in her lap. She did not lack for courage, Sarya noted.

“You did well, Teryani,” she finally said. “We must find some way to keep our enemies from collaborating against us.”

“The Sembians are close to breaking, Mother,” Xhalph observed. “Many of their mercenary companies have given up the battle already. As long as we refrain from attacking Sembia itself, there is little reason for the fat merchants who rule that land to pour more of their precious treasure into the Dales. Miritar will waste her time trying to convince them otherwise.”

Sarya turned to gaze at her son with some small surprise. It was not often that Xhalph discerned a point at which restraint became a virtue, but he was right about Sembia. As long as she did not directly threaten the Sembians in their rich cities to the south, they would be inclined to write off the Dalelands as a bad investment.

“If they are as close to giving up the campaign as you think, then we should help to decide the issue for them,” Sarya said. “Leave them be for now. While they count the costs of their campaign, we will turn our full strength against Miritar. But we must see to it that their negotiations lead to nothing.”

“What do you wish me to do, Lady Sarya?” Teryani asked.

“If you can slay Miklos Selkirk or Ilsevele Miritar, and make it seem like an act of treachery by one side or the other, that should fix things nicely,” Sarya said. “I suspect it would work better if you arranged for Miritar’s death and affixed the blame to the Sembians.”

“It will be as you wish, my queen.” Teryani bowed again, acknowledging the command. Then she looked up to Sarya. “Neither the palebloods nor the Sembians will find cause to believe that we had anything to do with it.”

“Good. I think I may have the perfect instrument for you to use in this work.” Sarya smiled cruelly, implications dancing in her mind. “I will place at your disposal the services of the Cormanthoran drow. Use them to handle the slaying, and see to it that they are found to be in the employ of Sembians who wished Ilsevele Miritar dead… but did not want to be caught at it.”

Teryani’s dark eyes danced with mischief. “If I may be so bold, my queen, that is a subtle and brilliant ploy indeed. I will endeavor to carry it off as you have commanded.”

“I have every confidence in you, Teryani,” Sarya told her.

Despite Donnor’s healing spells, Galdindormm grew weaker. The small gray gnome passed in and out of consciousness in their small refuge against the darkness outside. Whenever he passed out, his arms and legs began to move with an awful life of their own. Araevin suspected that if they had not restrained the poor wretch, his own traitorous limbs would have dragged him to the edge of the precipice and toppled him over the edge in answer to the sinister call that still gripped him.

Araevin essayed a spell to break whatever curse lay over the gnome, but his magic did little more than reward the mortally exhausted gnome with a respite of peaceful sleep. And so Galdindormm died not long after crawling to their refuge, body and spirit spent beyond any hope of resuscitation.

Donnor arranged the deep gnome’s limbs as best he could, and spoke Lathander’s prayers over the body in the hope that death had brought some sort of release for the broken creature. When he had finished, he turned to Araevin and asked, “Do you know how his people would inter him, Araevin? I don’t like the idea of leaving him with nothing more than a blanket to cover him.”

“I don’t know much about the svirfneblin, but I would guess that they are content to sleep under stone,” said Araevin. He glanced around the alcove, and sighed. “Let’s loosen some rock from the walls of this niche, and use it to build a cairn for him.”

When they had finished, the gnome’s body was covered with a mound of stones. Doubtless his own folk would have done better, but Araevin judged it as good as they could do given the materials at hand. He did not like leaving Galdindormm only a few feet from the oppressive darkness outside, but he resolved that if they ran into any more of the deep gnomes, he’d tell them where and how Galdindormm was buried. They would improve on the arrangements if it was important to them.

With Galdindormm seen to, Araevin took out his shard of the Gatekeeper’s Crystal and weighed it in his hand. Perhaps it was the absolute quality of the darkness around them, but it seemed to him that the shard’s pearlescence was brighter and more marked than before. A sign that the second shard was close? he wondered. To make sure, he cast another divining spell, seeking some sign of the shard’s twin. The resonant tone in his mind was clear and close.

It was also straight down.

“Well,” he murmured, “I suppose I was expecting that.”

“The shard’s somewhere down there, isn’t it?” Maresa said, nodding at the still blackness beyond their narrow ledge. The genasi heaved a deep breath and smacked one fist against the stone floor. “Damn it all, I just knew it.”

“I’m sorry,” Araevin told his friends. “The signs are clear to me. I will have to descend into the abyss.”